Male with present female sitting on the branch side by side (~25cm) of intruding male and biting by side of body with wings, what was produced the given sound. On the end both birds beating nearly simultaneously.

Across Ireland, Stock Doves have become very thin on the ground since agricultural methods changed during, especially, the 1980s. The switch from spring-sown crops to autumn planting effectively removed a whole community of seeding weeds that were part of the bird's diet. Throw in general intensification, the use of herbicides and the usual arsenal of 'Silent Spring' chemicals and it is no surprise that many bird populations are rapidly disappearing across Irish farmland. Stock Doves colonised Ireland from Britain. Occasionally some were noted in winter (the first in 1875) but by the early twentieth century breeding was occurring in many counties, except the far west. In the new millennium one of the few reliable places to see the species is on the Copeland Islands off the coast of County Down. Here farming is either not practised or consists of sheep grazing. The land is not subject to any input of chemicals, nor is it ploughed. Unfortunately, the largest island is used as a Pheasant shoot and perhaps some Stock Doves are also killed. In any event, all the Stock Doves are extremely wary. They nest in burrows, mainly rabbit burrows. The bird in this recording was not seen. I heard it calling (the call is also what passes for song) when I was inside a tent. I suspect it was perching in low bushes and was returning to either exchange incubation with its mate or, possibly, to feed its own young. All this is speculation, of course. The same bird was doing the same thing when I camped in precisely the same spot a week ago. During its calling session - the bird was in the vicinity for up to an hour at a time - the gaps between each burst of calls averaged from 20 seconds to a minute or so. I have edited the gaps. Each burst of calling was fascinating. The bird took two, maybe three notes, to 'get going'. These preliminary notes were close to just one syllable. The first proper note always has two (albeit subtle) syllables. Complete bursts contained from 6 to 11 double-notes. Although difficult to hear the minor distinctions, as the phrases were uttered, the middle and later double-notes were just a bit more disyllabic. In fact, the final one or two notes (sometimes only the terminal note) tended to revert to being less clearly disyllabic. The wing-whirr (that is, the flap of wing-beats) was softer than in Rock Dove and can be heard at 0:14. Other birds that feature are, in chronological order, Lesser Black-backed Gull (L. f. graelsii), Wren (juvenile), Water Rail, briefly at 0:10 and (overlapping beginning of Stock Dove call) at 1:17, Pheasant, Curlew and Jackdaw. A few deep coo notes were also given (this seems to be the only other sound in the bird's vocabulary) but were too quiet to be easily discerned.